Living with the Bittersweet

Grief is so much different in experience than in perception.  Losing Ruby, mourning her, missing her, and loving her is something I’ll do for the rest of my life.  In my life before loss I had this perception that grief was some sort of straight line and you got through it and you went through these stages in order.  I thought that at some point you’d mark an end. I was so wrong.

There are good and bad days still 18 months after losing her. The good days are finally starting to outnumber the bad, but not a day goes by without remembering, without wondering what it’d be like if she was here. How would her 1 year old personality fit in with her brothers and sister? What would she look like? What color would her eyes be? Her hair?

Today is 2 years to the day after seeing those 2 pink lines on the pregnancy test on my 29th birthday(the best present ever) letting me know her little life was growing deep inside of me. Today marks the beginning of the part of the year all my memories of her are in. Seeing her up on the ultrasound screen for the first time, hearing her heartbeat, choosing her name, finding out my gut feeling was right and she was a girl, telling Paul, Bella, and Seamus the baby was a sister and her name was Ruby. It is bittersweet.  

I love the memories, how she feels a bit closer in this part of the year because that’s when she was alive.  The bitter part is the pain of her not being here, that the memories are all I have because her body is buried six feet under the frozen Nebraska dirt and she is in heaven with Jesus instead of in my arms. 

Don’t get me wrong, I’m thankful for that hope of seeing Ruby in eternity, but hope doesn’t always erase pain.  Hope and pain, the bitter and the sweet, they all exist together.

One Year Later

My Dearest Ruby,

How has it already been an entire year since I first held you in my arms?  The weight of missing you makes it feel like it’s been much longer sometimes. The days have flown by the same as the first precious year with each of your siblings have though. It feels strange to speak of your first birthday when if you’d have lived you would just be 8 months old right now, yet here we are.

One year later my heart still aches to have you with me, my arms still ache to hold you and kiss you one more time.  I still wish there was something I could have done to keep you here, still wonder if there was any choice I could have made differently that would have let you stay.  I couldn’t keep you safe and as your mom that breaks my heart.   I’d heard the words cord accident when talking about risks with my pregnancy with your big brother Paul because of low fluid, but I never dreamed one would steal you away.  It took you anyway and we’re all here without you.

Living in a world without you in it hurts.  Sometimes it hurts so bad I can feel it in my chest before the tears leave my eyes.  Outliving you just feels wrong.  I shouldn’t be outliving you. It’s not how it was supposed to be.

I think about you all the time.  What would you be like?  Would you have your sister’s sass? Would you be loud and messy or quiet and orderly like one of your brothers? Who would you look most like?  Would you have my brown eyes or your daddy’s hazel ones? What would your smile look like? What would have made you giggle?

Your brothers and sister would have been wrapped around your fingers.  They love you so much and it’s so hard to watch them miss you. The first time we visited your grave with them after your funeral Paul thought we’d get you back and be able to take you home.  Bella has a pink Ruby bear she sleeps with just like I do. Seamus sweetly exclaims “baby Ruby” every time he sees your picture. I watch their eyes follow babies wherever we go.  I don’t know how to answer the question, “When do we get to have a baby to bring home?”  I don’t know how to comfort them when they speak the words, “I wish Ruby got to come home with us” any better than by giving hugs and being honest in telling them that I wish that too.

As for your daddy, know his love for you is fierce. I could see it in his face when you were born. He was just as proud and overjoyed and in love with you as he was with Paul and Bella and Seamus.  He wishes as much as I do that you could have stayed with us.  He would have done anything to protect you if he could have.

I think of heaven so much more often now that you’re there.  I wonder what it’s like for you and try to remind myself that each day I live is one day closer to eternity with Jesus and with you.  I wonder if you’ve gotten to meet the ladies you were named after, my great-grandmother and your daddy’s grandmother. I wonder if they’ve gotten to hold you and rock you like I never could.  I wonder if you’ve met the sweet babies that the other brave mamas that I know had to say good bye to.  I wonder if you’re up there playing with Cora Grace, Kalliope, Evan, Anakin, and so many others.  If maybe you’ve gotten to meet my uncle Gary or the siblings I never got to meet in this life.

So on this first birthday, I guess what I want to say is best summed up in two quotes. The first is one that one of the kind nurses put on the photo collage they made us with picture of you and the second one I ran across just last week

“I carried you for every second of your life and I will love you for every second of mine.”

“Grief is astronomical. It wraps you up in its enormity and makes it difficult to breathe. But understand that the enormity of grief is indisputable proof that love is, somehow, even bigger.”

I grieve so deeply for you because of how incredibly much I love you my sweet Ruby.  I’m thankful for every single moment I got to carry you and for every second we had you in our arms. I’m still trying to figure out where to go with this lifetime worth of love I have to give you when you said goodbye before we really got to say hello.

I love you so much and you are now and always will be a part of the very fabric of my heart.

Love,

Mommy

The T-shirt

When I picked it out, it was such a joyous purchase. A little green t-shirt with the words "Super Cool Big Bro" across the front.  Paul and Bella got t-shirts too, but they both already held the titles of big brother and big sister. A big brother! Seamus a big brother!  We were having another baby. The list of people that knew about our baby was still short on the day I picked it up.  I knew, Daniel knew, our kids knew, my doctor knew, and now it was time to tell everyone else. We threw that shirt on Seamus and waited for family to notice and understand what that meant at our Easter lunch.  It was a fun way to share our excitement. It was such a happy thing.

I never dreamed that instead of packing that shirt into his overnight bag to wear to the hospital to meet his sister, I'd be trying to hide it away because some days the reminder of how things should be is too hard.  It's not that I could ever forget that Ruby was born still, but some reminders are just more painful than others.

Seamus wouldn't let me get away with it though. He spotted where I'd hidden his t-shirt and insisted on wearing it. He's picked it to wear more than once since then now.  It's a bittersweet thing, but I decided I need to give him this. I shouldn't try to steal or hide his big brotherhood. While it looks nothing like I imagined, he will grow up knowing Ruby's name, that she is his little sister.  He's a big brother and I'll let him wear that title proudly on his shirt until he outgrows it.  I'll treasure his exclamations of "baby Ruby" when he sees her picture even on the days it brings tears to my eyes.  He has no less right to love her and grieve her in his own way just because he 3 instead of 30.  She's his little sister and he is a "super cool big bro" just like his shirt says.

The Last Family Picture with Everyone in It

We’re over halfway through the first month of the New Year.  I finally took down the Christmas tree and other decorations this week. I’m thinking about projects I need to get done around the house and updating pictures of the kids with some of the cute ones I snapped over the holidays.  When thinking about this I realized something: the last picture I have with our whole family in it is one we took on Easter when I was still pregnant with Ruby.  

One of my biggest regrets is not getting a picture of us all together when the kids came to the hospital to meet their sister after she came silently into the world.  In the haze of shock and grief I didn't think to ask anyone to snap one for us. Every family picture from here on out she will be missing.  

I know there are lots of sweet ways to try to include her in family photos to come. I know other families include their baby by putting their special bear or a framed picture in family photos and maybe we’ll do something similar in the future. She’s part of our family and we will always want to include her if we can.  

In this moment, I'm still struggling with the empty place she should fill. I’m experiencing the painful truth that nothing will erase her absence. I wanted to watch Ruby grow up, I wanted to know her in the way I know each of my other children. When her heart stopped beating that future died with her. I’m learning how to parent a child who is not here.  There is no rolling over for the first time, no first steps, no first words, no learning to read, no leaving home, no getting married, no having a family of her own, and no other hundreds of things I would have loved to do with her.  There are instead all these horrible firsts. First Thanksgiving without her, first Christmas without her, waking up in a year in which she never lived.  If I think about it for too long it feels too much to bear.

So for now, I won’t update family pictures on our wall any further than Easter 2017.  I will collage her picture next to updated pictures of her brothers and sister. I’ll keep my home and lock screen on my phone as they are with Ruby on one and that last family picture with everyone in it on the other.

When Grief and Grateful Coexist

Thanksgiving is fast approaching.  The weather is finally turning cold.  Christmas feels right around the corner. I’ve watched so many friends post each day about something they’re thankful for.  It is something I’ve even done in the past.  My daily Timehop has been filled with things I’ve posted I’m thankful for in years past.  This year is different.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m still very grateful for many, many things.  When I see those posts made by others in my feed, I take time to think about something to be grateful for right then.  

I made the decision not to post things daily this year though. You see, I’m still hurting, still grieving the loss of precious Ruby, and sometimes the things I’m thankful for feel too heavy to share.  Sometimes they’re things I have mixed emotions about.  Sometimes the hurt and the gratefulness come together and reduce me once again to tears.  So much emotion lies just below the surface and bubbles up so quickly when I least expect it.  I’m learning how to let emotions exist together I never thought would keep each other company.  Learning that feeling one doesn’t take away from the other. 

Just a few of the things I’m grateful for this year in no particular order are:

I’m so grateful for the kindness of every single one of the medical professionals that were part of Ruby’s birth and the time we got to spend with her before saying goodbye for the last time.

I’m so grateful for the hundreds of pictures the nurses took for us, for the nurse who grabbed my phone and said, “You need pictures of her on here too.”

I’m so grateful for a husband who is very understanding, and who takes time to comfort me when I know he is hurting too.

I’m so grateful for our living kids.  I feel both the blessing and responsibility of parenting them in a new way since losing their sister.

I’m grateful for the love of family and friends; especially so for all the care, extra prayers, and encouragement in this very difficult season.

I’m grateful that we have all of our needs met. That there’s a roof over our head, clothes on our backs, and food in our stomachs.

Most of all I’m thankful for the grace, love, and comfort of a God who promises to be close to the broken hearted (Psalm 34:18).

If I don’t seem myself this holiday season, it’s because I’m not.  I’m this unfamiliar new version of myself I’m still trying to figure out.  Be gentle with me.  If you are, I’ll be grateful for that too.

Having Trouble With No

It was a pretty standard mid-week outing with the kids. The day had seemed extra long, the kids all seemed to have a bad case of cabin fever, and by dinner time my motivation to cook anything was waning so off to Burger King we went.

The kids were over the moon about their kid’s meal toys and cardboard crowns and laughing and generally having  a good time while we talked and ate. I had to remind them to settle down and eat a few times, but over all it was a good break for all of us. In the midst of this merriment I looked over at Bella and she was crying. Immediately I asked her what was wrong. Her answer, “I’m just having trouble with no right now.”  Sure I’d misunderstood, I asked again. She answered, “I’m having trouble with the word no.”

The funny thing is, I didn't remember telling her no about anything right then.  We had a brief conversation about it being ok about being disappointed when the answer is no instead of yes and how grown ups feel that way sometimes too. Then, as so often happens, she jumped to the next thing like the moment was forgotten.

But I didn’t forget. That was almost 2 weeks ago and that little conversation has turned over and over in my mind. It has been something I’ve talked to God about in my prayers and talked about with my husband a few times. We’ve had some pretty big no’s in our marriage. Eight years in and our lives look radically different than we thought they would.  We live somewhere we never expected to, my husband works in a field he never expected to after many no’s in the one he went to school for, and I’m back in school because we’re finding we are going to need me to work soon when I was always sure the kids would have to be much older before I even attempted such a thing.  

But one of the hardest no’s happened 2 months ago.  I went to the doctor and found out our daughter Ruby had no heartbeat. We had one precious day of getting to hold our perfect, beautiful stillborn daughter in our arms, but we had to leave the hospital with no baby, no Ruby.  

So I guess you could say I’m having trouble with no too. 

This grief journey is a hard one, and I don’t think I’d believe it was survivable without all the people who have been willing to say, “Hey, I’ve been through a similar loss.” It’s a bittersweet thing to be encouraged by what you know was/is such a horrible no in someone else’s life, but I am thankful for each person who has reached out to us in this way. I’m so thankful for all the people who’ve reached out and said, “I’m here if you need to talk” or “I’m praying.” 

This season has become all about being ok with not being ok, but hanging onto hope because of the yeses we have in Christ and I think it will continue to be.  It’s about learning to trust God even with the no’s that have already happened and the ones we’re afraid of in the future.